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T n E 
VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL. 

BY 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY S. EYTINGE, Jr. 




BOSTON; 
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY. 

New York: II East Seventeenth Street. 









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Copyright, 1848 and 1876, 
By JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 

Copyright, 1866 and 1894, 

By TICKNOR & FIELDS 

Anv HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. 

A// rights reserved. 




NOTE. 



According to the mythology of the Romancers, the 
San Greal, or Holy Grail, was the cup out of which Jesus 
partook of the last supper with his disciples. It was 
brought into England by Joseph of Arimathea, and re- 
mained there, an object of pilgrimage and adoration, for 
many years in the keeping of his lineal descendants. It was 
incumbent upon those who had charge of it to be chaste 
in thought, word, and deed ; but one of the keepers hav- 
ing broken this condition, the Holy Grail disappeared. 
From that time it was a favorite enterprise of the knights 
of Arthur's court to go in search of it. Sir Galahad was 
at last successful in finding it, as may be read in the sev- 
enteenth book of the Romance of King Arthur. Tenny- 
son has made Sir Galahad the subject of one of the most 
exquisite of his poems. 

The plot (if I may give that name to anything so slight) 
of the following poem is my own, and, to serve its pur- 



Note. 

poses, I have enlarged the circle of competition in search 
of the miraculous cup in such a manner as to include, not 
only other persons than the heroes of the Round Table, 
but also a period of time subsequent to the date of King 
Arthur's reign. 






LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 






Engravings by A. V. S. Anthony. 




J I. 


Vignette . . " Title-Page 1 


II. 


" Over his keys the musing organist " . 


6 


III. 


" What is so rare as a day in June .? " 


8 / 


IV. 


" Here on the rushes will I sleep "... 


12 •/ 


V. 


"As Sir Launfal made morn through the dark- 
some gate, 






He was ware of a leper " 


15 ' 


VI. 


" Down swept the chill wind from the mountain 






peak" 


1 8 ' 


VII. 


" Within the hall are song and laughter " . 


20 '^ 


VIII. 


" He mused, as he sat, of a sunnier clime " . 


23 y 


IX. 


" The leper no longer crouched at his side, 






But stood before him glorified " . 


26 / 


X. 


" The castle-gate stands open now " . 

? 


28 



THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL. 



PART FIRST 





PRELUDE. 



/^VER his keys the musing organist, 
^^^ Beginning doubtfully and far away, 
First lets his fingers wander as they list. 

And builds a bridge from Dreamland for his lay ; 
Then, as the touch of his loved instrument 

Gives hope and fervor, nearer draws his theme, 

6 



The Vision of Sir Laimfal. 

First guessed by faint auroral flushes sent 
Along the wavering vista of his dream. 



Not only around our infancy 

Doth heaven with all its splendors lie ; 
Daily, with souls that cringe and plot, 
We Sinais climb, and know it not ; 
Over our manhood bend the skies ; 

Against our fallen and traitor lives 
The great winds utter prophecies ; 

With our faint hearts the mountain strives ; 
Its arms outstretched, the druid wood 

Waits with its benedicite ; 
And to our age's drowsy blood 

Still shouts the inspiring sea. 

Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us ; 

The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in, 
The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us, 

We bargain for the graves we lie in ; 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

At the Devil's booth are all things sold, 
Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold ; 

For a cap and bells our lives we pay, 
Bubbles we earn with a whole soul's tasking : 

'T is heaven alone that is given away, 
'T is only God may be had for the asking ; 
There is no price set on the lavish summer. 
And June may be had by the poorest comer. 

And what is so rare as a day in June ? 

Then, if ever, come perfect days ; 
Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune, 

And over it softly her warm ear lays : 
Whether we look, or whether we listen. 
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ; 
Every clod feels a stir of might, 

An instinct within it that reaches and towers, 
And, groping blindly above it for light, 

Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers ; 
The flush of life may well be seen 



The Vision of Sir Laiinfal. 

Thrilling back over hills and valleys ; 
The cowslip startles in meadows green, 

The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice, 
And there 's never a leaf or a blade too mean 

To be some happy creature's palace ; 
The little bird sits at his door in the sun, 

Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, 
And lets his illumined being o'errun 

With the deluge of summer it receives ; 
His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings, 
And the heart in her dumb breast flutters 

and sings ; 
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest, — 
In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best 



^ 



Now is the high-tide of the year, 

And whatever of life hath ebbed away 

Comes flooding back, with a ripply cheer. 
Into every bare inlet and creek and bay ; 

Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it, 

9 



The Vision of Sir Latinfal. 

We are happy now because God so wills it ; 
No matter how barren the past may have been, 
'Tis enough for us now that the leaves are green ; 
We sit in the warm shade and feel right well 
How the sap creeps up and the blossoms swell ; 
We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help 

knowing 
That skies are clear and grass is growing ; 
The breeze comes whispering in our ear, 
That dandelions are blossoming near, 

That maize has sprouted, that streams are 
flowing, 
That the river is bluer than the sky, 
That the robin is plastering his house hard by ; 
And if the breeze kept the good news back, 
For other couriers we should not lack ; 

We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing, — 
And hark ! how clear bold chanticleer, 
Warmed with the new wine of the year, 

Tells all in his lusty crowing ! 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how ; 
Everything is happy now, 

Everything is upward striving ; 
'T is as easy now for the heart to be true 
As for grass to be green or skies to be blue, — 

'T is the natural way of living : 
Who knows whither the clouds have fled ? 

In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake ; 
And the eyes forget the tears they have shed. 

The heart forgets its sorrow and ache ; 
The soul partakes the season's youth. 

And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe 
Lie deep 'neath a silence pure and smooth. 

Like burnt-out craters healed with snow. 
What wonder if Sir Launfal now 
Remembered the keeping of his vow ? 




PART FIRST 



" 1\ /r Y golden spurs now bring to me, 
And bring to me my richest mail, 

For to-morrow I go over land and sea 
In search of the Holy Grail ; 

Shall never a bed for me be spread, 

Nor shall a pillow be under my head, 

Till I begin my vow to keep ; 

Here on the rushes will I sleep. 

And perchance there may come a vision true 

Ere day create the world anew." 

Slowly Sir Launfal's eyes grew dim, 
Slumber fell like a cloud on him, 

And into his soul the vision flew. 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

II. 
The crows flapped over by twos and threes, 
In the pool drowsed the cattle up to their knees, 
The little birds sang as if it were 
The one day of summer in all the year, 
And the very leaves seemed to sing on the trees 
The castle alone in the landscape lay 
Like an outpost of winter, dull and gray ; 
'T was the proudest hall in the North Countree, 
And never its gates might opened be, 
Save to lord or lady of high degree ; 
Summer besieged it on every side, 
But the churlish stone her assaults defied ; 
She could not scale the chilly wall. 
Though round it for leagues her pavilions tall 
Stretched left and right, 
Over the hills and out of sight ; 
Green and broad was every tent. 
And out of each a murmur went 
Till the breeze fell off at night. 

^3 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

III. 
The drawbridge dropped with a surly clang, 
And through the dark arch a charger sprang. 
Bearing Sir Launfal, the maiden knight, 
In his gilded mail, that flamed so bright 
It seemed the dark castle had gathered all 
Those shafts the fierce sun had shot over its 
wall 

In his siege of three hundred summers long, 
And; binding them all in one blazing sheaf, 

Had cast them forth : so, young and strong, 
And lightsome as a locust-leaf, 
Sir Launfal flashed forth in his unscarred mail, 
To seek in all climes for the Holy Grail. 

IV. 

It was morning on hill and stream and tree, 
And morning in the young knight's heart ; 
Only the castle moodily 
Rebuffed the gifts of the sunshine free, 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

And gloomed by itself apart ; 
The season brimmed all other things up 
Full as the rain fills the pitcher-plant's cup. 



As Sir Launfal made morn through the dark- 
some gate, 
He was ware of a leper, crouched by the same, 
Who begged with his hand and moaned as he 
sate ; 
And a loathing over Sir Launfal came, 
The sunshine went out of his soul with a thrill, 
The flesh 'neath his armor did shrink and crawl, 
And midway its leap his heart stood still 

Like a frozen waterfall ; 
For this man, so foul and bent of stature, 
Rasped harshly against his dainty nature, 
And seemed the one blot on the summer 

morn, — 
So he tossed him a piece of gold in scorn. 

IS 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

VI. 

The leper raised not the gold from the dust : 

" Better to me the poor man's crust, 

Better the blessing of the poor, 

Though I turn me empty from his door ; 

That is no true alms which the hand can hold ; 

He gives nothing but worthless gold 

Who gives from a sense of duty ; 
But he who gives a slender mite, 
And gives to that which is out of sight, 

That thread of the all-sustaining Beauty 
Which runs through all and doth all unite, — 
The hand cannot clasp the whole of his alms, 
The heart outstretches its eager palms, 
For a god goes with it and makes it store 
To the soul that was starving in darkness before. 




THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL. 



PART SECOND 





PRELUDE. 



T^OWN swept the chill wind from the 
mountain peak, 

From the snow five thousand summers old ; 
On open wold and hill-top bleak 

It had gathered all the cold, 
And whirled it like sleet on the wanderer's 

cheek ; 
It carried a shiver everywhere 
From the unleafed boughs and pastures bare ; 
The little brook heard it and built a roof 
'Neath which he could house him, winter-proof; 
All night by the white stars' frosty gleams 
He groined his arches and matched his beams; 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

Slender and clear were his crystal spars 
As the lashes of light that trim the stars ; 
He sculptured every summer delight 
In his halls and chambers out of sight ; 
Sometimes his tinkling waters slipt 
Down through a frost-leaved forest-crypt, 
Long, sparkling aisles of steel-stemmed trees 
Bending to counterfeit a breeze ; 
Sometimes the roof no fretwork knew 
But silvery mosses that downward grew ; 
Sometimes it was carved in sharp relief 
With quaint arabesques of ice-fern leaf; 
Sometimes it was simply smooth and clear 
For the gladness of heaven to shine through, 

and here 
He had caught the nodding bulrush-tops 
And hung them thickly with diamond drops, 
Which crystalled the beams of moon and sun, 
And made a star of every one : 
No mortal builder's most rare device 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

Could match this winter-palace of ice ; 
'T was as if every image that mirrored lay 
In his depths serene through the summer day, 
Each flitting shadow of earth and sky, 

Lest the happy model should be lost, 
Had been mimicked in fairy masonry 

By the elfin builders of the frost. 

Within the hall are song and laughter, 

The cheeks of Christmas glow red and jolly. 
And sprouting is every corbel and rafter 

With the lightsome green of ivy and holly ; 
Through the deep gulf of the chimney wide 
Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide ; 
The broad flame-pennons droop and flap 

And belly and tug as a flag in the wind ; 
Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, 

Hunted to death in its galleries bhnd ; 
And swift little troops of silent sparks. 

Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear, 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

Go threading the soot-forest's tangled darks 
Like herds of startled deer. 

But the wind without was eager and sharp, 
Of Sir Launfal's gray hair it makes a harp 
And rattles and wrings 
The icy strings, 
Singing, in dreary monotone, 
A Christmas carol of its own. 
Whose burden still, as he might guess, 
Was — " Shelterless, shelterless, shelterless ! " 

The voice of the seneschal flared like a torch 
As he shouted the wanderer away from the porch, 
And he sat in the gateway and saw all night 
The great hall-fire, so cheery and bold. 
Through the window-slits of the castle old, 
Build out its piers of ruddy Hght 
Against the drift of the cold. 




PART SECOND 



f 



I. 

nr^HERE was never a leaf on bush or tree, 

That bare boughs rattled shudderingly ; 
The river was dumb and could not speak, 

For the weaver Winter its shroud had spun ; 
A single crow on the tree-top bleak 

From his shining feathers shed off the cold 
sun ; 
Again it was morning, but shrunk and cold, 
As if her veins were sapless and old, 
And she rose up decrepitly 
For a last dim look at earth and sea. 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

II. 

Sir Launfal turned from his own hard gate, 
For another heir in his earldom sate ; 
An old, bent man, worn out and frail, 
He came back from , seeking the Holy Grail ; 
Little he recked of his earldom's loss, 
;No more on his surcoat was blazoned the cross, 
/ But deep in his soul the sign he wore, 
'*'''The badge of the suffering and the poor. 



Sir Launfal's raiment thin and spare 

Was idle mail gainst the barbed air, 

For it was just at the Christmas time ; 

So he mused, as he sat, of a sunnier clime, 

And sought for a shelter from cold and snow 

In the light and warmth of long ago ; 

He sees the snake-like caravan crawl 



TJlc Vision of Sir Launfal. 

O'er the edge of the desert, black and small, 

Then nearer and nearer, till, one by one. 

He can count the camels in the sun, 

As over the red-hot sands they pass 

To where, in its slender necklace of grass, 

The little spring laughed and leapt in the 

shade, 
And with its own self like an infant played, 
And waved its signal of palms. 

IV 

"For Christ's sweet 'sake, I beg an alms" ; — 

The happy camels may reach the spring. 

But Sir Launfal sees naught save the grewsome 

thing, 
The leper, lank as the rain-blanched bone, 
That cowered beside him, a thing as lone 
And white as the ice-isles of Northern seas 
In the desolate horror of his disease. 



The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

V. 

And Sir Launfal said, — "I behold in thee 
An image of Him who died on the tree ; 
/ Thou also hast had thy crown of thorns, — 
I Thou also hast had the world's buffets and 

scorns, — 
f And to thy life were not denied 

The wounds in the hands and feet and side : 
Mild Mary's Son, acknowledge me ; 
Behold, through him, I give to thee ! " 

VI. 

Then the soul of the leper stood up in his eyes 

And looked at Sir Launfal, and straightway he 
. Remembered in what a haughtier guise 

He had flung an alms to leprosie, 
When he caged his young life up in gilded mail 
' And set forth in search of the Holy Grail. 

\ 



The Vision of Sir Laimfal. 

/The heart within him was ashes and dust ; 
I He parted in twain his single crust, 

He broke the ice on the streamlet's brink, 
I And gave the leper to eat and drink ; 



( 



T was a mouldy crust of coarse brown bread, 

'T was water out of a wooden bowl, — 
Yet with fine wheaten bread was the leper fed, 
, And 'twas red wine he drank with his thirsty 
soul. 

VII. 

As Sir Launfal mused with a downcast face, 

A light shone round about the place ; 

The leper no longer crouched at his side, 

But stood before him glorified. 

Shining and tall and fair and straight 

As the pillar that stood by the Beautiful Gate, — 

Himself the Gate whereby men can 

Enter the temple of God in Man. 



The Vision of Sir LaunfaL 

VIII. 

His words were shed softer than leaves from the 

pine, 
And they fell on Sir Launfal as snows on the 

brine, 
Which mingle their softness and quiet in one 
With the shaggy unrest they float down upon ; 
And the voice that was calmer than silence said, 
'' Lo, it is I, be not afraid ! 
In many climes, without avail, 
Thou hast spent thy life for the Holy Grail ; 
Behold, it is here, — this cup which thou 
Didst fill at the streamlet for me but now ; 
This crust is my body broken for thee, 
This water His blood that died on the tree ; 
The Holy Supper is kept, indeed, 
In whatso we share with another's need, — 
Not what we give, but what we share, — 
For the gift without the giver is bare ; 



L 



The Vision of Sir Laimfal. 

Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, - 
Himself, his hungering neighbor, and me." 

IX. 

Sir Launfal awoke, as from a swound : — 
" The Grail in my castle here is found ! 
Hang my idle armor up on the wall, 
Let it be the spider's banquet-hall ; 
He must be fenced with stronger mail 
Who would seek and find the Holy Grail." 

X. 

The castle-gate stands open now, 

And the wanderer is welcome to the hall 

As the hangbird is to the elm-tree bough ; 
No longer scowl the turrets tall, 

The Summer's long siege at last is o'er ; 

When the first poor outcast went in at the door, 

She entered with him in disguise, 

And mastered the fortress by surprise ; 
28 



The Visio7i of Sir Launfal. 

There is no spot she loves so well on ground, 
She lingers and smiles there the whole year 

round ; 
The meanest serf on Sir Launfal's land 
Has hall and bower at h'is command ; 
And there 's no poor man in the North Countree 
But is lord of the earldom as much as he. 




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